Faking Redemption
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: [post-Hunters] It's too hard to see clearly when you know your vision's been compromised these past two years. But an outside perspective can help, especially if there's a strong voice and a strong light attached.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Written for

Ultimate Sleuth Challenge, Kowloon Level 3 – write a multichap over 10k  
Becoming the Tamer King challenge, bronze tamer task 9: write a fic/chapter with a situation where someone is on over their heads, and write a fic/chapter that includes mental degeneration, de-aging or time-travelling  
The 100 Prompts, up to 100 MCs Challenge, #019 - inebriate  
Diversity Writing Challenge, i32 - write in the angst genre  
The Memoir Challenge  
The Endurance Challenge, week 23

* * *

 **Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 1_

My head pounded for days after the incident, and that was more than fair – or less than fair, depending on how you looked at it. Taiki-san had to go to the hospital and he didn't deserve that all. All he'd done was save the world two years ago and this was our gratitude, _my_ gratitude –

But I could ask myself how I could do such a thing and it wouldn't matter. I'd done it anyway, like I'd just snapped, like I'd been in a temper and I'd had a brief lapse of control and just struck out –

But that was just Taiki-san. That wasn't his only crime, or even the last of them. He wasted the Brave Snatcher too. Someone with even a little less tenacity than Tagiru would never have pulled it off and what would have happened then? What would have been our fate when Quartzmon rewrote the world? What sort of world would it have been?

I had a glimpse of it, at least. A deserted world, where every neighbour was far from the next and there was no commodore, no relations. Would it have people in it at all? Digimon? Or would the world be filled with those mindless drones of Quartzmon: the ones we'd shot down who knew how many times and yet they felt nothing when their comrades in arms were shot down before their very eyes. They felt no fear, no anger, no desperation. They fought the same if there was one or a hundred or a thousand of them and Astamon had been the same. I'd just never put it all together: all the puzzle pieces only I could see.

I was the only one who _could_ have put it all together. But I didn't. I thought nothing of the fact that there were no hunters at all until a few months after Psychemon and I. I just thought I'd never met them. There were too many Hunters, two years later, after all. Not all of them gathered at the island where Volcdramon was the prize. Not all of them gathered on the final day where it was decided who'd use the Brave Snatcher – and the words I said at that moment… Maybe they were right, or at least half right. Maybe Tagiru was the only person who could have pulled it off or maybe there'd been someone because we barely knew them. We barely knew them and we wrote them off as powerless, as worthless. And Quartzmon too had only sought the digimon that appeared strong at first glance to suck the life out of.

How did I miss that? All the digimon I captured and never used, never glanced at again and never realised when they no longer were at all… Like Metallifekuwagamon, and even then I didn't realise it. The digimon that was there and then not, that was terrified when he looked beyond Tagiru and his friends with the Dobermon and the net and when did Astamon strike, when he'd been behind me the entire time? It was like I blinked out of reality whenever Astamon – Quartzmon – did something he didn't want me to see. But could I put the blame on something I could never prove? Could I even allow it? Accept it?

And if I did, the fact that he cared enough to hide such matters meant I was more of a help to him free, following my own twisted path. And I thought it was a white path, full of roses. I'd become the best hunter and defeat Quartzmon, and then I could surpass the hero who'd glittered red – red roses – in the field that day, who'd first saved the human race when the hand of Bagramon had crashed down.

I was a civilian, then. A civilian who saw the general of the army awash with hope and seize victory and so became emoured. It was a noble goal. Still was, because I'd shared that with Tagiru and we'd wasted all that time dilly-dallying when we could have been friends and friendly rivals instead.

It was too easy to wonder how much of that had been orchestrated by Quartzmon – and then wonder if I wasn't giving him too much credit to alleviate my own position. Because the fact of the matter was most decisions throughout the two years had been mine. I chose to hunt only the strong, and to do it in a way that lengthened my hands that reached for them. I chose to make no bonds with my digimon except the ones that would strengthen Astamon: the ones I used for a digi-xros and no more, when I could have been friends with all my digimon. I chose to stay away from Taiki-san and the hunters that allied themselves with him and chase him from afar, as independent as I could be, instead of cultivating a friendship and learning more closely from him.

And it was far too easy to go around in circles with these thoughts. There was no Airu at the door, saying one of her traps had caught something. There was no Ren, complaining that Tagiru and Taiki and their friends were causing trouble. And I never did tell Tagiru where I lived, did heI And my parents were doing what they always did and that left me to lie in bed and stare at the ceiling and swirl with my thoughts and the only interruption would be my own body begging for more material needs.

Part of me wished someone _would_ come – but why would they? My parents were at work. I had no siblings. And my classmates didn't care enough to visit him at home when school was out, and even less so in the past two years when I'd skipped so many days of school and even more outings. And the hunters would all be at the hospital with Taiki, or at their own homes. And I should be there – or shouldn't. I didn't have the right to show my face there, after all, even if the responsibility was mine.

Not even all the hunters knew the responsibility was mine. Just the ones who'd born witness to it – and who knew how fast or sluggishly the news would travel, if it did at all. Or what the consequences would be. Or what they should be. What I should do about it now, when it was too late to do anything at all except meaningless apologies that couldn't bring back what had been lost, and almost lost.

I could only remember, and think, and the memories were still awash, ablur. Part of me wondered if I even wanted to see the clandestine truth because then it would be undeniable: who was to blame, and who was not. Because nothing would absolve my blame and, because of that, how could I place the blame on anyone else?

I could only thank whatever god out there that Tagiru was Tagiru, who could do two roles in one that weren't ever meant to be combined – and, on top of that, he put the broken Brave Snatcher together. Put the pieces of broken hope together when there was no-one to pick him up, no-one to shout their encouragement – and the only people who could depend on him were already swept away and consumed.

Only a day before that, I'd thought we were equals: standing on the same soil and heading for the same goal albeit by slightly different paths. But our paths were always in view of each other, and would always be. But I hadn't imagined, until that point, that Tagiru would ever catch up to me. I had a year's head start, after all. And when the digimon of Xros Wars didn't come back with their generals, I had a chance to catch up to Taiki as well.

Rather, I'd had the chance to completely tear up the world. And all I had to pay for that was a headache that staring unblinking at the ceiling seemed to dull?

And, despite all of that, I still missed him. Psychemon. Astamon. Quartzmon. Whatever and whoever he was, he'd been my partner, my _aibou_ and my first digimon. It was because of him I'd ever had the chance to try and chase Taiki-san at all, to enter that same world, that hunt… To meet Taiki-san face to face, and meet all these other people who'd been involved in the hunt as well. Ren and Airu and had I become their friend and comrade first and foremost because they were useful? But regardless, they were friends now. At least from my perspective. And I owed them too. Something I could never repay. Them, and Tagiru and Yuu, and Taiki-san – and how many other hunters had I crossed in the hunting game that had been more hunt than game, if only I hadn't been so blind as to not notice it sooner.

The ceiling blurred. Finally. Tears put the regret I thought I felt into something tangible. Told me I wasn't just trying to convince myself, wasn't just blinding myself to the truth that lay underneath the dust of my thoughts. Pain was retribution. Tears were the personification of my regret. My parents would notice some days later when my eyes were only slits of red downstairs because the glare of the sun was so strong, but that would be later, when the headache had finally begun to fade, and I couldn't tell them anyway. What would I say? I watched the news the first night, when Quartzmon fell. There was no whisper of what had occurred. No word. Not even a hint that an entire day had faded away into the gloom. My parents hadn't even asked why I'd missed school that day, but I'd missed so much already. They'd tired of it. Accepted I had no interest in it. But that wasn't the truth, either. There'd just been the hunt, instead. More important. Everything. And a lie.


	2. Chapter 2

**Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 2_

Tagiru and Airu and Yuu showed up, about three days after the incident. And a part of me hoped and expected that because Airu was one of two hunters who knew where I lived and Tagiru was tenacious enough to find my address through some means or other. Honestly, he was likely to not take the obvious route and just ask someone who might know first off… But Amano Yuu was more pragmatic. He'd probably realised Airu and Ren were the most likely to know where I lived.

When I peeked out of the window, wondering who in the world was ringing the doorbell at eleven in the morning, I saw the three of them lined up on the doorstep with Tagiru in between the other two.

That was almost kind of cute. Would have been, a few days before, because one of the things we could happily tease Airu about was her near obsession over Amano Yuu. But now I wondered why she'd led them to my doorstep. Why Ren wasn't with her. Why she'd even bothered to come. Why Amano Yuu had bothered to come when we barely had a relationship at all. And why Tagiru had come.

The afternoon wasn't the same as the morning, after all. It had become very, very, different. The entire board had changed. My perspective of the board had been thrown off and then it was all over before I could do a damn thing about it.

Tagiru got tired waiting for me to answer the doorbell and yelled my name loud enough for the entire street to hear…or thereabouts. One of the neighbours stuck their head out of the window, even. I sighed and went downstairs because, really, I had no reason not to let them in. If they came to berate me, it was no less than I deserved. And if, on the other hand, they came bearing sympathies or forgiveness, I could just pretend to accept them and send them back on their way or else twist those sentiments so I received something more deserving in the end instead.

My head spun on the stairs. No doubt because I hadn't been down recently. Didn't really need to. There was a bathroom upstairs – two, really, if you counted the one in the master bedroom. And 'kaa-san left me a tray in the mornings and assumed I'd eaten lunch and dinner before they got back home. But the breakfast was plenty. It had always been plenty and I suppose that was what got me into the habit of skipping lunch more often than not. It was for reading, back then. Lunch hours spent in the library dreaming about what it would be like to have magic powers and be a hero – and then the sky opened up and revealed the Digital World and a real hero the likes of which I could aspire to become.

Instead, I was the villain tucked into the tale to throw the true heroes off their victory path, and I'd done a stellar job of that as well: revealed in the end there only because I so overtly sabotaged the scene – because using the Brave Snatcher was always meant to be the turning-point of the tides, but not like that.

'Ryouma! Are you in there?' Tagiru. Yelling again and now knocking on the door too, as though the doorbell wasn't working. It was. It was working perfectly. Maybe one day we'd get an intercom system but yelling worked just as well until then. Would've worked better of the original plan had worked out. We only had this big of a house because 'kaa-san and 'tou-san had been planning a big family – but it never happened. Was just me, and now the house is too empty and too big. But they're still trying. They don't want to give up quite yet.

As for Tagiru… like I was going to answer if I wasn't, but I was and I couldn't just pretend I wasn't. Not when I'd geared myself for the encounter. So I unlocked the door and let it swing back. Yuu looked somewhat surprised. Airu just cocked her head and grinned at me in her usual way and Tagiru's frown of frustration morphed into a smile as well. 'I was worried you weren't going to answer,' he said – or something along those lines.

I shrugged and let them in. The less I looked at those expressed, I thought at the time, the better. I bustled around in the kitchen instead. 'Tea? Coffee? Hot chocolate? Lemonade? Orange juice?'

'Coffee,' sung Airu, but I wasn't surprised. She always wanted coffee, and we gave it to her, and then ran after her when something caught her attention. But a sleep-deprived Airu was scary so we took the lesser of the two evils in that matter. The only thing I was surprised about was how…normal, it all was.

Then again, wasn't I doing the same? Playing host like I hadn't taken all their hard work and dreams and stomped all over them. Though I suppose I didn't do _that_ , exactly. More like they filled their cookie jars and never reached the top because I was siphoning coins off when no-one was looking. It's kind of like that thing with charity, where they say the left hand shouldn't know what the right hand gives. Though, in my case, it's what the right hand _takes_ , isn't it? Takes and feeds to Quartzmon and the coins are digimon and yet we never realise, _I_ never realise, that digimon should have been far easier to miss than loose change in a jar.

I missed Yuu's and Tagiru's requests in that and Airu has to sing them in my ear. Tea and orange juice respectively. And it turned out all three of them always had the same thing, and Taiki-san would normally have orange juice as well. Tagiru babbled on about that at some point or other. Can't remember if it was that particular visit or another one though, but I soaked up the information on Taiki-san anyway. At that point though, I wondered why I bothered. I was so far behind I'd never get there now and I couldn't even muster up the enthusiasm to try. After all, trying was what led to all this. Thinking I could become the best hunter, when I was never a hunter to begin with but a prize that had been hunted that day two years ago – or was that thought, too, just another way to attempt to alleviate my guilt, my responsibility?

'You'll blow your house away if you sigh so much,' Airu scolded, and one of the boys snorted. I thought it was Yuu and maybe that's why I remembered it. Yuu always looked too dignified to do such a thing. And Tagiru sounded so disbelieving in his next statement that I don't think it was him. Something about the house being so big. Something about the Amano house too…

And then Yuu explained that it was just him and his father, so it just felt bigger like that when there'd been five people once upon a time. And then the conversation went off on a tangent and I forgot the rest, or didn't listen. I listened to the clicks of cups touching the counter and spoons touching the cups and I figured I should probably make something for myself as well and pulled out another cup. But which one did I want? Something warm. I was suddenly missing warm things –

I took a glass of orange juice too, straight from the fridge. It froze my teeth and stabbed at my brain and there were already needles stabbing at the brain. But that was the whole point. Why should I pick something I enjoyed? I was going to be different from Taiki-san on this one, unless he didn't like orange juice for the sake of orange juice but drank it because he worked himself too hard otherwise.

I tuned into the conversation when Tagiru yelled my name again and I wondered how many times he'd called it in a more normal tone before that. I wasn't that far away, physically anyway. But he raised an eyebrow at me and asked exactly how far away I'd been and I guess he'd noticed I'd mentally drifted pretty far away.

And not one of them had mentioned Quartzmon, and they'd mentioned Taiki-san only in the context of the orange juice.

So I supposed that meant the role of opening the can of worms fell to me. 'Quartzmon,' I said truthfully and bluntly. And I turned around to face them so I'd see their expressions.

They were all taken aback by my bluntness and Yuu and Airu were staring at each other, before thunderstorms appeared on their faces and they turned away.

Belatedly, I wondered when Yuu would take a hint, because Airu was a trap master but never quite subtle. But I didn't care much, at the time. I was still waiting for the other shoe to drop and my visitors seemed determined to hold on to it. Even then, when I opened the can. Because Tagiru let off a spiel that sounded very much like he was trying to lighten the mood and it might have worked if things weren't so…personal.

That's how things went, wasn't it? Some pins were too deep to just laugh out and Tagiru stopped talking soon enough. He realised it too. Or else the silence of his audience clued him in. But no-one I knew was really good at reading those cues. No-one had realised it, after all. It had caught them all by surprise. _I_ had caught them all by surprise. But the naivety of children was truly a wonderful thing, for them to march into the home of the enemy and let me close the door behind them and never think of what advantage they'd just handed me, never think I could betray them again…

Because it was very easy to say I couldn't, I wouldn't. Very easy to say Quartzmon was gone and it was all his fault but that was simply absolving me of my blame and the role I'd had to play in it. And that part of me who attacked Taiki-san? How could any of us be sure it wasn't gone?

Probably, the only one who noticed I was still holding the spoon in a fist with white knuckles was me myself. But you could stab a person's brain out with a spoon. It all just depended on where you aimed – or were allowed to.


	3. Chapter 3

**Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 3_

They'd scattered themselves over the couches. They were set in a C-shape and Airu and Yuu were as far away from each other as possible while being on the same three-seater couch (though there was a dent in the middle that showed it hadn't been Yuu's first choice but he'd gotten wedged in anyway), while Tagiru was sitting next to Yuu and on the middle couch.

Which left me to take the seat across from Airu and farthest from all of them. And I wondered why I even bothered to remember that later on, but at least the division was clear. And my decision, and theirs as well… for leaving almost two thirds of the couches for me to pick a seat from. The perfect scene for a confrontation… and foolish to some level as well, because they'd picked the side that let them see me in the kitchen, which also meant I was now between them and the door.

Airu sipped at her coffee and raised a brow. Yuu didn't touch his tea. Tagiru had already finished half his orange juice and mine was full and untouched as well.

Somehow, it's very easy to remember moments like that, even when you forget the words.

And when the words began… well, I forgot exactly what they were for the most part. But Tagiru started it again. Something about how I shouldn't blame myself and I wondered if I should say I didn't or laugh at how worthless those words seemed when cast adrift like that. I wound up doing the second despite myself because, quite suddenly, I didn't want to lie.

Then again, I'd been lying without even knowing – or at least consciously noting – that was lying, so that wasn't really saying much. So I laughed instead and Tagiru stopped talking – in mid-sentence, I think, and both Airu's eyebrows vanished into her fringes and crease lines appeared near Yuu's mouth like he was trying very hard not to frown. I almost told him not to bother. We were being honest here, after all. But then again, I never set that precinct and neither did they. I just decided to be honest for myself. For that little portion of it anyway.

At some point, I wound up admitting defeat. We'd have kept going in circles otherwise and, to be honest, Tagiru and Yuu together were a formidable force. Maybe the old Clockmaker had been wrong. Maybe it wasn't just who was the best hunter, but who was the best _team_ and Tagiru was the only new member of Xros Heart, wasn't he? Even Yuu had battled against Bagramon before. And so had Akari-san and Zenjirou-san, even if they didn't have Xros Loaders to show for it until a few days ago.

Actually, that made the Digital World seem rather ungrateful. The old Clockmaker was pretty much handing out Xros Loaders like lollypops and yet he couldn't give them to the two people who'd missed out on them in the first round until he was in desperate need of their help? Not that I saw what they accomplished with them. They were buying time, after all. Buying time so we hunters could battle it out to determine the strongest of all of us, and who'd pull the Brave Snatcher out of the earth and use it to strike down Quartzmon…

Except I didn't use it for that. And because of that, Tagiru, who'd already been weakened because he lost, had to drag it up a second time.

'I'm sorry,' I said to him. 'For the Brave Snatcher.'

But, really, that apology was as empty as his encouragement and he just shrugged. 'Well, it wasn't your fault, really.'

But it was. Because saying it wasn't alleviated me of the blame and it was my fault. I wasn't just a puppet that had been strung along. I was a naïve child that had been prodded, perhaps, but I'd walked and spoken and fought of my own free will and all of that had turned out to be part of some greater design. There'd been a mould and I'd walked right into it, fit it perfectly… And that's how people were when trifled with by the whims of those who took the script into their own hands. Would we call them gods, I wondered? Or where they also like us once upon a time: the ones who wrote the script, the ones who directed it, and the ones who fell into their roles and only realised too late they hadn't been acting on their own whims at all?

The conversation did take a surprising turn after that. And not from Tagiru: Tagiru was so earnest but Ryouma didn't think he understood at all, or even could. He was so bright-eyed and yet he wasn't blind to the important things after all. But as much as I wanted to let myself float free like that, I couldn't. Not anymore. Not after I'd missed so much, and let so many other things happen.

Ignorance was a crime, but it wasn't quite ignorance I was guilty of. Suppression, perhaps. Supressing the things I noticed that didn't quite fit into my ideal because I was too immured, too drunk on the idea of being just like that red-tinted hero I'd seen that day between worlds…

But it wasn't Tagiru who interrupted that. It was Yuu. Yuu who I barely had any interaction with at all because Airu was like that. Once she saw something cute, she staked her claim on it and she'd staked her claim on Amano Yuu and be it far from Ren and I to argue with her on any of those fronts. She was too useful and she was our friend – and look at how my priorities sit, even now.

But aside from that and what I'd seen of Yuu from the final battle, I knew pretty little. And he tended to stand back in the hunts; help out of his help was needed (except for the SuperStarmon thing, and my pride was still smarting by how well he'd played Tagiru and I there) but let Tagiru take the hunts. I wondered at that, because he rarely digixrossed and, when he did, it was typically to help out Taiki rather than do anything with Tsuwamon. Did he even have any other digimon in his digivice aside from Damemon? It's not something I ever really bothered to ask and it wasn't my business either way.

But still, I was surprised to see him speak up. Frankly, I wondered why he came at all. He didn't seem the sort to give second chances with naïve backings. But when he told his story, I understood. The story of Bagramon and DarkKnightmon and three groups of armies under four generals when I'd only seen the final battle and all four of them standing together. He told me about how he'd thought the Digital World was a game. How he'd been invited there by DarkKnightmon and given a Xros Loader. How his sister had followed him in and how she'd wound up as DarkKnightmon's temporary General in trying to get her brother back but he hadn't seen anything wrong with his situation at all. He told about how Taiki-san had saved Nene when DarkKnightmon had decided her usefulness was at an end, and how he'd gone out into the battlefield himself after that, as Team Twilight's General. And he told about the death game in the Digital World Hell which had turned out to be the turning point of it all: the changing of the tide.

And in the context of it not having been a game at all, it sounded horrific. Their lives tied to the flowers over their hearts and one of them had to die for the other to escape. I could only imagine their desperation, fighting their way out of hell and not just the humans, but everyone, everyone who'd been aware it hadn't been a game at all – so everybody aside from Amano Yuu.

'And I lost Damemon there,' said Yuu sadly, and to hide the waver in his voice, he gulped down his tea just like Tagiru had with his orange juice before. 'I lost Damemon and that finally clued me in: that the Digital World was real and all the Digimon was real as well, and I'd just killed so many of them and tried to kill three human beings, one of which was my own sister.'

I couldn't help but wince at that part. It's not nice to smile at another's misfortune or mistakes but I couldn't help but be relieved I didn't have any siblings to betray and that wasn't even the point of him spilling his guts and heart out on a sofa in my home.

Seriously, he even let Airu sidle up to him and put a hand on his arm. All the things I notice in retrospect…

But at the time, I was too busy trying to process… What, exactly? That I might get a second chance with Psychemon, with the digimon who should have been my real partner and who I thought _had_ been Psychemon and my partner but he'd only turned out to be a fake? Or that I'd have a second chance to fight evil and save the world and be a hero this time instead of an anti-hero or straight out villain? Or everything was all right in the world now and people like Tagiru and Taiki-san wouldn't let us drown in self-pity and regret? Or a bit of all of those, I supposed, but they didn't know the hunt was on until a year later themselves.

'What did you do?' I asked him. 'Before the hunt started up again?'

'Even after the hunt…' He sighed. 'I was jealous of Tagiru, you know?'

I blinked at that. Airu snorted. 'He's a sun,' she said. 'Too bold and too bright. Burns the skin of fair-haired boys like you two.'

She was speaking metaphorically, of course, but she made sense. Tagiru was very different from both Yuu and myself and maybe I was more similar to Yuu than I'd ever thought.

It was food for thought, and when Yuu explained the main reason why he'd been so jealous of Tagiru, I understood something else as well.

Yuu hadn't even had a partner the first three months after he'd found out about the digimon hunt. He'd known the digimon had been reborn but Damemon hadn't come back to him and he'd thought that was his punishment, to watch Tagiru with his new friend, watch Taiki with the digimon king… and yet he participated in the hunt anyway, as an observer and an advisor and a friend, because that was what he was capable of doing.

He hadn't just curled up in bed and wallowed in self-pity when it came to doing something.

And, in my case, there was something I'd been putting off for far too long: going to see Taiki-san. And even if the apologies were superficial, I owed it to him and the other tamers to give them, didn't I? At least that…

And that visit wound up with the cheer team winning the round.


	4. Chapter 4

**Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 4_

It still took a couple more days to muster up the – whatever you'd call it – to visit Taiki-san. It wasn't really courage, because I was the one who'd put him in that situation and, really, an apology was the least I could do. Even if an apology fixed nothing at all. And yet, a part of me still balked at the idea. Was it because I'd be finally accepting responsibility for it? Was it because I still wanted to hang on to that train of thought that said it had all been outside my control, that I wanted to be forgiven and absolved for hurting someone like so and almost sacrificing the entire world? After all, I'd pretty much handed Quartzmon our world on a silver platter.

And there wasn't exactly anything to do in the aftermath. No hunt to continue on with and who was I to comfort all those pining over the loss of their digimon friends? I couldn't even say I was pining over my own because I'd never known the real Pychemon, the real Astamon – and pining for the one I'd known meant pining for Quartzmon as well.

But I couldn't help but miss the partner I _had_ known, and I had no way of knowing how much of that had been true and how much an act to shape me into the mould… And how much of an active role I'd played, and how much passive – It was a big mess in the end and I didn't want an invoice of charges anyway. I'd wind up with more or less than what I expect because humans are impossible that way: they can't predict things so accurately and even when we're given confidence intervals to fill in we get them all ridiculous and wrong and all the research in the world isn't going to change that. We can't comprehend the world in a deep and clear enough level to be able to predict accurately. We lack whatever critical information makes that possible and that's fine, most of the time. It's the way things are supposed to be. It makes life interesting. It gives us things to work towards, to dream for –

But it also means we can fall into a hole and not even realise we're in one until it's far too late to find a way out again, and those times are the worst of all.

But the initial comfort of silence becomes stifling after a while and I wind up out of the house eventually – and, after that, the only place I can think of going is to the hospital. It's either that or wander aimlessly and that's just as oppressing a thought – and yet I do that anyway. I walk and walk until I can't walk anymore and then I collapse on the bus-stop bench and wait for a bus to come by. And then it's bus and train hopping and that's actually kind of nice because it keeps my mind occupied and walking in the vague direction of the hospital doesn't necessarily mean I'm on the right track when it comes to getting there by public transport – and that's assuming I was on the right track in any sense of the word. But it's impossible to be aimless on public transport. Nothing else to concentrate on except where you're going – where _I'm_ going –

So I wind up there after all. The hospital.

And then comes the next bit, and there's no backing out when I've come all that way. Effort begets effort, after all. The more blood and soil and sweat and tears you put into something, the less likely you are to pull away from it afterwards. At some point you cross the point of no return and then you just keep going and going and going, no matter what the cost. But that sort of thing is supposed to happen once you're an adult, once you've lived long enough to commit so wholly to something but, of course, sometimes we find things in childhood that leave lasting impressions. I think the digimon are one of those. And those are the things are harder to let go of, to forgive and forget. If I hadn't seen that final battle two years ago… I don't think it would have mattered so much now. Of course, to ask forgiveness for anything is hard and it's equally hard to admit that you're wrong, but those things that leave lasting impressions, that become guiding posts in your life, are the ones that don't fade with time.

Of course, it could have been that I was being melodramatic, that this was a wound time can heal if only I give it time. And maybe that goes for everyone and maybe I was a fool to come now, when clearly I couldn't ask for forgiveness, accept the answer, and then walk away with that.

Because, I thought right then, if I did walk away in one piece, it would be rather an actor in my place.

But I'd come that far. So I asked the room number and directions, and followed the stairs because an elevator was like a transport you weren't driving yourself: it gave far too much time to think. But still, I was there before too long because the longest part of the journey was already over.

And there was a crowd. Of course there was, even over a week after. And he recognised all of them as well: by face if not by name. They were an odd bunch without the digimon beside them, but that didn't matter so much with the digimon being what had brought us – them – all together.

They didn't notice me at first. I was just another figure standing in the crowd and maybe I would've gone unnoticed if Ren hadn't been a part of the crowd… Or maybe that was just wistful thinking.

In any case, Ren _was_ a part of that crowd and he spotted me (and, according to him, the colour of my hair might as well be a flag and I can't exactly argue, even if it's hardly my fault my hair has no pigments and I'd rather not kill it with hair dye or spray – unlike Tagiru). And, of course, when he called my name, everybody else turned to stare as well.

And they stared and did nothing, like blank faced dolls and, quite honestly, that's the most discontent reaction of them all. Because what the hell were they thinking? What the hell did they even know? I can't remember if only a few select had been a witness to Quartzmon's big reveal or they'd all seen it, and I don't know where they would have been otherwise. I do know most of them weren't there when Clockmon needed the extra juice. Airu and Ren were, and Xros Heart, and maybe Tagiru's Dobermon-partnered friend was there too. I can't remember. But all those Hunters weren't. There's a difference between a few select and an entire horde after all and they definitely weren't.

But they weren't needed in the end, after all, even if it had been close.

I wonder… Where had they been? Most of them hadn't been interested in fighting for the Brave Snatcher anyway, but Tagiru and I hadn't given them the chance anyway. Or…we had, if they really wanted to. They could have joined the fight and the last 'mon standing would have been the victor, but no-one did. Some of the whispers had trickled in through the fight. We'd been on another plane in that fight, somewhere the rest of them couldn't reach…

And yet, Tagiru and I had been on entirely different planes as well. Tagiru had been fighting Quartzmon even then and he hadn't even known it. I'd been fighting for entirely the wrong thing and I hadn't even realised it, drunk on the chance that I would finally get what I'd been aiming for…

But reality was that I'd taken the step to be furthest away, instead.

Ren reached me easily despite the crowd and tugged my elbow to drag me back. 'So Airu got you out of your blankets,' he teased, 'or was it Tagiru?'

'Yuu, actually,' I said, and why not admit that? It had caught me for a loop, after all.

Ren snorted. 'That's a surprise.'

Tell me about it. But pleasant surprises are preferable, all in all, even if I can and do appreciate how difficult it must have been for Yuu to talk about such things in the company of someone he barely knows and another girl who's been chasing him for the better part of a year like a rabid fangirl. Because as much as I like Airu, she can be rather… enthusiastic when she wants something and if she's still interested in Yuu, then he must have made a very firm impression.

And somewhere along the line, Ren and I and even Taiki-san by the looks of things, had realised the two of them would actually make a decent pair – if only Yuu would consider it.

But I've digressed. Again.

It was Ren, bantering like normal. And Airu had done exactly the same thing and I hadn't even taken the chance to call her out on it. Then again, they'd come with the sole purpose of "cheering me up", as Tagiru had put it, so maybe the opportunities I'd missed hadn't really been there in the first place.

As for Ren, he just chatted about how the others were feeling sorry for him because half of them or thereabouts had been suckered in by digimon as well – and that was probably true, even if not to the extent. The whole reason the hunt was on was because of how the lost digimon wound up influencing humans displaying negative emotions…

'And we've purposely pulled a few too, like the guy with the Kotemon.' Ren pointed. 'Geeze, Tagiru really let me have it over that but seriously, it wasn't my fault Dracmon couldn't evolve any other way…'

He remembered Ren complaining about that particular incident.

'But we're all here now.' Ren shrugged again. 'You just realised a little late, that's all. Pity, too. You might've gotten a real hunt in, otherwise.'

Which was Ren's way of saying he'd been in exactly the same situation as all the others who'd fallen prey to digimon who'd wandered in from DigiQuartz… Except he'd had the king of DigiQuartz instead of one of the lost ones and it was too late to grow from that encounter.

'It's not.' Ren was looking intense, and he rarely did that. Then again, I've rarely seen him give pep talks either. 'Sure, there aren't digimon hunts anymore but that's not all there is to life.'

And I guess I must've said that part out loud for him to respond to it. Or else he'd read it right off my face.

Although he was saying digimon hunts weren't the be all and end all to a bunch of retired hunters, so I guess his tact could use a little work.

And his subtlety, because he dragged me to Taiki's door, kicked whoever was in there out and shoved me in. 'Now go sort everything out and be ready to get on with your life when you get out.'

Yep, he definitely needed to work on that tact and subtlety of his. But it did the job. Here was me, and Taiki-san looking a little startled at the suddenness of it all, and no doubt a disgruntled if not hopping visitor suddenly finding themselves shut outside.


	5. Chapter 5

**Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 5_

Taiki-san might have been surprised when I showed up out of the blue, but his face morphed into a smile soon enough.

Then again, I've seen him protect a Pinocchomon who didn't remember him in the least and was trying to destroy all of us, including him and Shoutmon, at the time. So I suppose that's not saying a whole lot, that he's not pressing the buzzer and having me dragged out of the room… or else throwing one of those flower vases or something of the sort.

Then again, I've never seen Taiki-san actually lose his temper, no matter how angry he's been at the circumstances. Quartzmon is a case in point. And us, when he'd thought we'd gone too far in our hunting. And maybe, once we'd realised it went far beyond a game, we had gone too far even without Quartzmon's influence – or maybe it was Quartzmon's influence spreading to them as well. Airu and Ren. Maybe that was why they were the same as they always were. Or maybe…

'You'll get lost in your thoughts if you keep going like that,' said Taiki-san softly, still smiling. 'Come on. Have a seat.'

I took the seat almost automatically. It was like the school counsellor telling you they were going to fix everything and even if you didn't quite believe them, they were so smiley and gentle you couldn't help but follow along like a doll. And I did exactly that. Sat down and waited for whatever speech he'd give me and taper my reaction to it and then walk out and nothing's changed at all… right?

Isn't that how people "got over" things? But it sounded rather depressing, right then and there.

And maybe Taiki-san could see or at least guess what I was thinking as well, because he didn't say a word.

We just sat in silence, for a while. Taiki-san leaned back into his pillow and closed his eyes. I just sat and watched him. He was still looking a little pale, but otherwise better. Shoutmon had bounced back a lot quicker but he was a digimon taking a digimon's attack. Taiki-san would have bounced back far more quickly too, if I'd punched him instead. Assuming I _could_ punch him. The guy's a sporting prodigy after all.

'What are you thinking about?' he asked, suddenly.

So suddenly that I'm an automated idiot and blurt out what I really had been thinking about, at the time. 'I was wondering if I could punch you.' And then realising how badly that sounded, I scrambled to make amends. 'I meant if I _could_ punch you, as in if I was capable of doing it because you – I mean you're – '

He laughed and I cut myself off. He apologised as if he'd been the one to say something so wholly foolish. 'You probably could,' he said, finally. 'I'm not particularly good at any sport. I just get lucky. Of course, I wouldn't have a clue how you measure on that scale, but – ' He shrugged. 'You'd do just as well as anyone, I imagine.'

And there was Taiki-san's modesty at its finest. I've seen him in action and I'm telling you, that is not luck. And I'm not sure if I buy it all being instinct, either. Sure, he has fantastic instincts and that's why he's the hero, the General. But he worked hard too. Too hard.

'You're not that different,' he continued, 'from most of the other Hunters, you know.'

'The ones who became the victims of the lost digimon,' I muttered to my knees. 'So you say.' So Ren said as well. 'But none of them amounted to anything permanent.'

'Neither did this,' said Taiki and I had to stare incredulously at him for that because, really, he was saying that in a hospital bed. 'Really; it's got nothing to do with the Brave Snatcher. It's just the doctor isn't too happy with my blood tests.' He gestured at the drip, and for the first time I noticed it wasn't pain medication or anything of the sort going through but some sort of electrolyte mixture. 'There was blood too, the first couple of days. Again, nothing to do with the Brave Snatcher.'

I wasn't sure I believed him that far, but the electrolytes pointed to him having overworked and not taken care of himself again.

'Honestly,' Taiki-san was continuing. 'Akari was always saying I'd wind up in a hospital bed like this and I had to go and prove her right. But I just can't slow down, you know.' He had a pensive look on his face suddenly, and I found myself watching the way the colourless fluid slipped under his skin. 'Yeah, we took a beating from the Brave Snatcher and I can't just vanish into a Xros Loader and heal my wounds so they stick around for longer, but scratches and bruises and aches and pains… They all go away. The parts of me that can't heal so easily are all okay and they always were. After all, you hadn't been aiming to hurt us at all, were you?'

I stared at him. Again. Because of all the things I expected him to throw at me, that wasn't a question I'd considered in the least.

And what in the world made him think that, anyway?

I asked him precisely that.

'Isn't it obvious?' he asked. 'You defeated Tagiru in a one on one fight. The strength of a digimon isn't determined entirely by their own prowess, after all. You fight _with_ your digimon. Your soul fights with them. And regardless of anything else, when you were fighting with Astamon in that space the old Clockmaker had made for you guys, you were one with your digimon and Tagiru was one with his as well. Quartzmon couldn't have fooled everyone watching otherwise – and it's the same with every other battle the two of you have been in, as well. Quartzmon may have been Quartzmon and acting behind the scenes, but he was also the Astamon that was your friend and partner and the two of you had an understanding and a bond.'

'And what, Taiki-san?' I asked him bitterly. 'Isn't it because of all that that Quartzmon almost destroyed us all?'

'Maybe,' said Taiki-san, 'but he had everyone fooled. You were close and, really, the only one who can be blinded and forgiven because you were that close. But the rest of us had a perfect outside view and we still missed it. It's just like Lucemon in Heaven's Zone. He bided his time so patiently and never slipped up, as though the one we'd seen day by day was the real one and the one at the end the false. But who knows. Maybe Quartzmon panicked when old Clockmaker made his move, panicked when the Brave Snatcher came out of the bay. Maybe he just wanted to keep on living and hunting with you.'

'That's kind of ridiculous, Taiki-san,' I laughed, though really, I wanted to cry instead. Because Taiki-san was saying pretty much everything I wanted to hear and I wanted to believe it, I did, but that would mean absolving both of us and we'd played too big of a role.

'It's not,' he said seriously. 'And I might have misled you a bit, Ryouma-kun.'

I stared at him. That was the third time in a row he'd caught me off guard. 'How so?'

'I'll explain my earlier point first,' he deflected. 'About you and Quartzmon not aiming to hurt us, but rather just knock us out of powering the Brave Snatcher. It could've been any of the other five heroes, but you chose us.'

'Poetic irony,' I replied.

'Maybe.' Taiki-san was smiling softly. 'Tagiru told me, you know. About how you'd seen our final battle in the Digital World, against Bagramon.'

Honestly, I wasn't sure how I should feel about that. It was personal – and yet, it wasn't exactly something I'd told to Tagiru in confidence and if anyone else had a right to know, it was Taiki-san.

'And you worked hard with your digimon, trying to catch up to me. You and Tagiru too – and it must have seemed very unfair to you, watching us from afar and together.'

I shrugged at that. 'It was more that I didn't want you getting further ahead,' I admitted. 'It made it harder to catch up. As for Tagiru – I didn't really appreciate him until…that day.'

'He takes some getting used to.' Taiki-san smiled. 'It was the same with Yuu. But we all change when we come into contact with digimon – and it's not just digimon. When we come into contact with other people too. You two were rivals before either of you put it into words, you know.'

'Yeah…' It had taken me the better part of a year to realise it, but we had been. Or I thought we had been. Quartzmon had… twisted the old perspective.

'I've gotten on topic again.' Taiki rubbed his brow. 'What I meant to say was, when you and Astamon had the Brave Snatcher, you targeted me and OmegaShoutmon because we were the only ones who mattered to you, beyond being heroes. And when you did target us, you struck the chest armour-plate where OmegaShoutmon's defences were strongest, and where I wasn't sitting. We took most damage from the ripple effect.'

'You think either of us thought it through so thoroughly?' I asked. It was ridiculous. Still ridiculous. Kudou Taiki-san really was too forgiving, and everybody else wasn't much better. I wondered, at the time, if there'd be a lynching squad waiting for me once I got out of there. That'd be just perfect.

But no. Adults might learn to hold grudges but all the hunters were children and children were altogether too forgiving.

'No,' said Taiki-san. 'I think it was instinct talking there.'

The same sort of instinct that made Taiki-san good at sports he'd never played before, I wondered half-sarcastically before considering that statement a little more closely. Maybe that was exactly what Taiki-san was saying.

'As for Quartzmon,' Taiki-san continued – and this time, he dropped the big bombshell. 'Actually, I've had some inside info on that, so to speak.' And he went on to explain how he was still able to talk with Shoutmon through the Xros Loader – and the reason all those kids were here was so Wisemon could sort it out with their Xros Loaders too and not because Taiki-san was grievously hurt or they were planning a funeral or an intervention or anything of the sort.

Really? How was I supposed to see _that_ one coming?


	6. Chapter 6

**Faking Redemption  
** _Chapter 6_

'I'm sure Psychemon's around,' Taiki-san offered, finally. 'Digimon go through cycles of death and rebirth and they don't always keep their memories, but we humans who meet them remember, don't we?'

'Taiki-san…' Because Psychemon had never been my partner, had he? We'd never really met. Perhaps we should have, in that place between worlds from where I'd watched the final battle with Bagramon, but it was Quartzmon who'd come to me in the end. Which one did I want to meet? Or did I want to put it all behind me instead?

What am I talking about? I knew full well putting it all behind me was the _last_ thing I wanted to do.

'Or there's Quartzmon,' Taiki-san continued. 'Shoutmon can put you in touch whenever you like.'

'I certainly can,' piped up Shoutmon's voice – and honestly, if Taiki-san hadn't gotten around to mentioning that part, I'd have fallen out of my seat at his unexpected voice. 'Hello, Ryouma! That is Ryouma, right?'

'Uhh…hi,' I replied, or something thereabouts because really, what else was I supposed to say? Aside from Shoutmon having a good enough memory and sense of sound to be able to recognise my voice like that.

Taiki had more of his wits about him. 'Hello, Shoutmon,' he said warmly. 'How's everyone doing?'

'Organising, taking inventory, day to day running the digital world…' Shoutmon sounded like he was thumbing out a list. 'And babysitting baby Quartzmon. Gumdramon is teaching him to sneak into the kitchens.'

Gumdramon is teaching who what? I wondered. Really, that was far too mind boggling. I didn't even know what a baby Quartzmon would look like.

Taiki laughed. 'Well, this is the time to act like a child.'

'This isn't the time to be spoilt, though,' Shoutmon grumbled. 'Seriously, sometimes he's like the uncle who spoils his nephew and I'm the parent who has to clean up afterwards.'

'Though no child is going to go wrong with you raising them, right?'

'Definitely not.'

And I just sat and listened to that, letting the fragments of conversation pierce themselves together in my mind. So Quartzmon had hatched after all, was just a baby digimon – or had it already evolved into the child state and Taiki-san and Shoutmon weren't talking metaphorically after all? And he was causing trouble – but the sort of trouble little kids and apparently baby digimon all caused. Acting like and being treated like a normal newborn despite what he'd been before.

Lucky him, to be reborn without his memories or the weight of that responsibility.

But the opposite was also true. All the good memories were gone as well. The bonds. The truths. Any chance of actually finding out how much of Quartzmon had been what we'd witnessed at the end and how much had simply longed to be Psychemon, to be Astamon.

'There's more, too,' Shoutmon's dry voice was telling Taiki-san. 'We've got a Punimon who popped up and the two of them are getting into fights about every little thing. Like a pair of bratty brothers.'

'Is that so?' Taiki-san asked. He looked far too amused, honestly, though once we learned where the train of his thoughts were heading, it made a little more sense. 'Punimon evolve into Tsunomon, don't they?'

'Yep,' said Shoutmon. 'Or Nyaramon or Bukamon or DemiMeramon. And Tsunomon can evolve into a bunch of different things, including –'

Including Psychemon. I knew. But the chances of a random Punimon being the same Psychemon that had almost become my partner were ridiculously slim…

Though, in retrospect, I should have known by that point that the Digital World ran on lots and lots of what we humans called coincidences and miracles – and so did the human world, to an extent. Hadn't I already witnessed miracles and more than once?

And this time, the miracle is Punimon making a ruckus in the digital world. 'I wanna go! I wanna go!'

'Quiet down,' Shoutmon scolded. 'I'm talking to Taiki and Ryouma – whoops.' There were a few crashes after that, where both Taiki-san and I winced… I guess since we're both only children, that level of noise is… unexpected.

What follows is two voices, overlaying in a terrible symmetry and repeating the same thing over and over again, just louder than before. 'I wanna go! I wanna go!' And then they dissolved into what sounded like a bubble fight – since baby digimon weren't' capable of much more in the realm of attacks.

'Quartzmon! Punimon!' Shoutmon sighed. 'One day they'll survive in the same room together.'

By then, they'd progressed onto the "he's mine" vein of the argument, which was baffling since neither of them should remember anything about me at all, let alone want to be anywhere near me.

'And there you go,' said Taiki-san, still amused, 'though baby Quartzmon isn't usually that excitable. I guess that's Punimon's influence.'

'Punimon and baby Quartzmon are fighting… over me?'

To be fair, I was still having a time processing that.

'Well, they fight about everything and the kitchen sink,' said Shoutmon. 'But they're a little extra-enthusiastic now. They don't have memories of you, but they seem to instinctively remember… It's not quite the case of Damemon who remembered everything… Though we're not sure about Punimon actually, since the two of you never technically met.' He dropped his voice, presumably to stop the two babies overhearing him again. 'We didn't think it was a good idea for hope of a future relationship to ask Punimon if he remembered Quartzmon killing him. Especially since Quartzmon really does remember nothing. And aside from Gumdramon's and Punimon's influence, Quartzmon is quite good and well-behaved. And the other digimon all help out too, to teach him how beautiful the world we've built together is.'

'I…see,' I said, because Shoutmon was talking directly to me there and I couldn't think of another thing to say. And if the digimon (because all the others could forgive Quartzmon and work with him, then… what, exactly? Quartzmon didn't have his memories, or the weight of his past to bear as responsibility…

'That's good,' said Shoutmon with a smile in his voice. 'Because we could use the help.'

And I was thrown for a loop again, and by that point I was wondering if this wasn't just some elaborate set-up. They'd certainly had the time to organise it. Airu and Ren. Tagiru and Yuu. And Taiki-san and Shoutmon.

But at the time, all I said was: '…help?'

'Well, they are fighting more enthusiastically when it comes to you,' Shoutmon explained. 'Whenever we mentioned your name – we were checking Quartzmon's memories, and then Punimon overheard and reacted too and well, you see.'

Not physically, but I got the point at least.

'We're working on expanding the transportation system Wisemon organised for us,' Shoutmon continued. 'So then we'll be able to move between the Digital and Human worlds at will, without needing to go through unstable pathways like the Digi-Quartz.'

I saw where that was heading immediately. 'You'd trust me with them?' I asked.

'It's more a question of if you want them living with you,' Shoutmon corrected. 'They are quite noisy together. It'll be like getting little twin brothers that fight over every little thing.'

'Akari can tell you all about it,' Taiki-san piped up. 'She's got two younger brothers and a younger sister.'

The type of family my parents had always dreamed of. I wonder what they'll say when this actually becomes a reality.

But there wasn't really a choice. Not for me. I wanted them too much. And I owed too much – to them, and to the others as well. My parents would simply have to adjust to it, as bizarre as it would seem at first. But I think they'd manage. It was the closest they were going to get to a house full of kids until in-laws and grandkids came into the equation, anyway. And I'm in seventh grade. That won't be happening for a _long_ time.

'I want them,' I admitted at some point – but, really, Taiki-san was looking as though he expected it. 'I want the Psychemon I never got the chance to meet, and the Quartzmon who was my partner. I want them both still, even after what's happened, and I know it's selfish…'

I was crying by then, and Taiki-san wriggled out of the hospital blankets to pat me on the shoulder.

'Why is it selfish?' he asked. 'They're both your precious partners. But without their memories and at this young and impressionable age, they're –'

'The weight of my responsibility,' I finished.

And they were. And would be. And that… was okay, because it was something I could do, to make amends and fill the hole in my heart Quartzmon had left behind. The perfect ending, really. The perfect outcome. And the trickle of my headache that remained was gone as well, like the headache was just a manifestation of my stewing instead of doing something productive, and of my inability to _do_ anything productive in relation…

I could do something: now, through my digivice, and in the future as well. That changed things. That changed everything. And now that it was possible, it was so much clearer as well: it was the perfect ending: the outcome I'd wanted all along and I hadn't been able, back then, to put it into words.

But now I can.


End file.
